Automotive SEO

Car Dealers embrace In-Store Reputation Management Platform developed by Automotive Advertising Network, that was unveiled at the recent 2012 NADA and 2012 DMSC conferences.

The Automotive Advertising Network is the industry’s first content syndication and search engine optimized network designed to promote car dealers’ inventories on national, regional, local and specialty sites. Now AAN members have the ability to capture reviews while customers are still in the store finishing up the buying the process.

The in-Store review platform along with the syndication services for inventory and content is considered to have a heavy influence on Automotive ZMOT.

The AAN helps dealers dominate ZMOT by owning multiple AAN created web assets and syndicating consumer reviews so that no matter where the consumer looks, an AAN client is always top of mind and top of results pages.

About the Automotive Advertising Network

The AAN is the industry’s first optimized, dealer-centric network with no third-party ads, designed to promote car dealers’ inventories on national, regional, local and specialty sites.

AAN is a comprehensive digital marketing and branding platform that utilizes proven practices in Search Engine Optimization (Automotive SEO), inventory advertising, social media and content publishing to advertise and sell dealer inventory.

Using these proven SEO strategies, the AAN helps dealers establish high quality, exclusive leads for less money, translating into higher closing ratios and lower costs for the dealers.  Plus, unlike traditional third party lead collectors, the dealer’s own inventory-listing pages are free of competing ads. 

The AAN has changed the playing field for dealers who have typically had to compete with national third- party lead providers who have long had an advantage on the search engines because of their national footprint and corresponding search authority.

For more information on becoming a member visit our website at http://www.automotiveadvertisingnetwork.com or give us a call at 732-450-8222

Until recently dealers and dealer website vendors have thought Dealer Microsites are an important tool for Automotive SEO. Generally Automotive Microsites are created for a specific reason, for example to appear high in SERPs for a targeted keyword or to focus on a particular dealer topic.

And its true that Microsites if done correctly can provide these benefits. There is an additional benefit that these Automotive Microsites provide. They become a part of Automotive ZMOT influencers.

According to Google on average consumers would visit 18 different sources before they decide on what brand of car they want to buy and where. On top of it the most common search queries are related to Price, performance and styling.

If the microsites created for dealers answer these questions and are keyword targeted at the same time, chances of these sites appearing among the 18 different source is high. This means consumers are most likely to come across your assets online than your competition’s assets.

This is very important to capture the online audience.

If your online reputation far exceeds than your competition than the likely hood of a consumer shopping for their next car in your dealership is higher.

Automotive Microsite ZMOT Strategy

An Automotive Microsite done to be part of ZMOT influencers need to have content that addresses Price, Performance and Styling of the brands they carry. It needs to target the most competitive keyword in their market and GEO-Target.

A microsite also needs a strong linking strategy for the keywords it was created for.

Having relevant content, answering common questions, strong linking strategy and keyword rich content makes the microsite appear strong in search results and becomes a part of the 18 different sources that influence consumer to shop at your dealership.

Automotive IRM influences ZMOT

There are other ZMOT influencers, dealers online reputation being the most important factor that need to be constantly monitored and improved. Google Place reviews, AAN Reviews, Yelp, Dealer Rater etc. are some of the places where the dealer need to concentrate on. It is important to have positive reviews to demonstrate the experience a consumer will likely have when they visit your dealership.

In summary, to sell more, dealers need to have to have an effective online strategy that includes microsites, positive online reputation, inventory, content and review syndication. Automotive Advertising Network provides all this for a low monthly fee.

Call us at 732 450 8222 and we will demonstrate how AAN can help you in providing more online resources to help in the ZMOT process for a car dealer.

According to Google’s data, on average a car buyer visits 18 different sources before they make a decision on what car they want and where to buy. An automotive dealer marketing campaign should include strategies in which the dealer online assets appear in more places.

Dealers need to invest time, effort and money to make sure the most popular questions are answered for the prospective consumers on different sources where the consumer is likely to come across during their ZMOT process.

According to Google the most important questions are related to price (64%), vehicle performance (44%) and styling (37%). Content should be written around these topics and published in places where consumers are likely to see. Obviously the content need to be optimized for search engines to capture as many places in searches as possible.

Assuming a consumers are educated on price, performance and styling, the other thing they would look for is where to shop for their next vehicle.

Online Reviews play an important role in providing a consumer an idea of the experience they would have when they visit the dealership. If dealer’s online reputation is great, you can expect more sales.

Google place reviews play an important role in Automotive ZMOT. And dealers need to put extra effort in making sure their online reputation is excellent. The best time to obtain a review is while the consumer is still at the dealership after they purchased their vehicle. This also gives the dealer an opportunity to reconcile any potential negative reputation that they might get from a not so happy customer.

According to Google “If your business received a review that you don’t agree with, we encourage you to use business owner responses to reconcile the situation with the customer. We know a negative review can be frustrating, but we believe that engaging with a customer to address his or her concerns creates the best environment on Google Places. “

AAN (Automotive Advertising Network) has tools and technology to address and be a big part  of ZMOT influencers. With content syndication across 100% automotive websites addressing the most common consumer questions, in-store reputation management tools and, Review Syndication across 100% automotive search optimized websites, AAN provides dealers a way to influence car buyers ZMOT.

Dealers who have competition and lead grabbers appearing on Google’s page one results for their name need to fight back. Its important for dealers make sure and have an excellent strategy for counter the page one situation.

As part of Automotive Advertising Strategy can signup for Automotive Advertising Network membership and can get help.

As a recent example of how it works, Infiniti of Mission Viejo needed more dedicated assets on page one for their name. AAN created a subdomain on their name off the national site cardealersale.com. Then high ranking AAN network assets are used to build valuable and authoritative content and links back to the newly created automotive microsite. Google bot immediately recognized the new site, off-site SEO content and backlinks and positioned the dealer microsite on page one for their name.

Below, you can see the power of AAN and how dealers can leverage the AAN membership.

If you are looking for a Page one strategy you can contact us and we will demonstrate how the network can help you achieve you organic SEO goals using your inventory, SEO content and the power of AAN.

Recently while searching for a laptop to buy, I already knew what I wanted to buy. It’s an HP Core I7 that was on sale in Staples. The zero moment of truth is I already decided not only what to buy but also where to buy.

Then I decided to test out Google and see if Google can give me the best deal in a reputed store for the laptop I am interested in for a better price. I typed “laptop” in Google. I noticed something very new showing up. Since Google wants to show the best results for my query, gave me options of highly optimized and ranking sites in my area to buy a laptop on page one. Staples is not one of them.

Then I noticed a new thing showing up at the top of the results and just below the paid listings. Google is now showing options to filter results based on the broad product search term I used.

What Google is actually trying to do is providing me with options to refine my search. A click on any of these options are automatically added to the search box and results are displayed for the new focused search.

Since many of my clients are auto dealers and have created numerous Automotive Microsites for dealers, I tried a few more searches for Toyota, Cars, Honda, and the results seem to be normal like old days. But when I searched for Tires, or brakes the related search option showed up.

As interesting as this seems, it appears Google started providing this option mostly for products, and is not being shown on actual OEM brand searches yet. But my gut feeling is very soon we start seeing Stores, Models, and even service centers for the keywords like “Toyota”

Impact on Dealer SEO strategies

Needless to say this will have a huge impact on organic SEO strategies for car dealers. My speculation is that Automotive Dealers who invest on the best Automotive SEO strategy now will benefit when Google opens this for other Automotive Search Terms.

The trick seems to be on page one for these important keywords and right now the greater impact is on Fixed Ops Microsites related searches. Search for Tires or Brakes and you will see what I am writing about.

Members of Automotive Advertising Network have a unique opportunity that helps dealers achieve this faster with the network of sites. Dealers who understand the game changing rules of Google Optimization will be able to add custom links for these major keywords, that will help their link target rank higher and eventually when Google provides Related Searches for these terms your dealership will show up.

If you are interested in AAN and Content Syndication on Dealer Microsites give us a call for a demo at 732-450-8222.

Google has once again changed its position regarding reviews in Google place. It started dropping third party star count. This change is a welcome change for some dealers who have bad third party reviews but for those dealers whose reviews were better off with third party counts have to step up their game in getting reviews posted in Google Places from their Customers.

What can Dealers do to improve their review counts?

Automotive dealers need to have an in-store reputation management policy to manage Google Places. With a whole lot of smart phones on the market selling at considerably lower prices, dealers need to start using Android phones, iPhones, iPads etc. The Google Places app can be installed right on them.

Dealers can use Google Boost to spice up their PPC strategy. Boost is an up and coming strategic advantage which we have been discussing with clients.

Third party reviews are still important and will still be indexed and viewed by your prospective customers.

In-Store IRM Processes and Training

Dealers looking for direction on how to best adapt to these changes should start an in store reputation management process that include using 3G smart devices.

Dealers must set processes to identify consumers with Google accounts while they are in the dealership. 550,000 Android devices are activated a DAY and all have Google Accounts. Google empowered consumers can post reviews directly on Google Places, with their account, from a mobile device.

If you need help with in store training, processes, and strategy on reputation management, give IntelliFusion a call.

IntelliFusion Technologies is an Automotive SEO and IT company and AAN Reseller. For your automotive advertising needs send us a note or call us at 732 450 8222 and see how the Automotive Advertising Strategies are built for your specific needs.

Although Search Engines are constantly changing their algorithms to better serve the consumer, the basics of SEO haven’t changed. Exact match domain URLs, Titles, Description and Keywords still play and continue to play a major role in Search Engine optimization. Maintaining high relevant content and keyword linking strategies are still important and are fundamental to Organic SEO. More than half the battle is won once these fundamentals are in place on your website. Then depending on the competitiveness in your area, your SEO Marketing efforts need to be supplemented with Microsites and PPC.

Automotive Advertising strategies used in AAN (Automotive Advertising Network) is built on the same principles outlined here.

For Search Dominance in your area for key money phrases, its imperative you use these key terms while linking. And deep linking these keywords will only make it better and faster.

Press Releases and Content publishing on several content publishing platforms like Free Press Release and the network of AAN sites is important to further achieve this dominance. For a busy dealership selling cars, its quite often very difficult to spend enough time on these Automotive Marketing and Search Dominance Strategies. To help dealers achieve this strategy, IntelliFusion has created a Content Syndication Tool to minimize the time it takes to publish content not only on AAN sites but also other blogging platforms like WordPress, Blogger, etc. We are continually developing new tools to further content syndication on most of the free platforms.

If you are member of AAN, you can schedule some time with Ananth Godavari for a quick demo and training on the tool. If you are not a member of AAN then perhaps its time to have a chat on what AAN can deliver for your dealership.

Here is what some dealers have to say about this new content syndication dashboard designed and created by Ananth Godavari and Automotive Advertising Company.

Gary Sanders from Stevinson Auto: The new www.dealersyndicator.com will save Internet Managers time and allows more post on more sites. Before the new member tool, I was manually adding VDP post to three sites. I could see the search results in Google, but was short on time to do our entire inventory. I am excited to use this tool. Once again Ananth, Brian and the PCG team is helping get our inventory more exposure.

Joey Abna from Peltier:  Ananth,

I just wanted to take a moment to let you know how excited I am to have the new features that the Dealer Syndicator delivers to my business. I will be trained on the new tools tomorrow but I couldn’t wait to play around. I created a blog post for one of our WordPress blogs in less than five minutes the first time I used the tool. It was so easy to just click through the options copy the code and paste into my wordpress site.

These new tools will allow me to build even more content with optimized anchor text in much less time than ever before. I can’t wait to use the rest of the tools.

If you want to take your Automotive Advertising to the next step contact us and we strategize your marketing efforts.

The 2011 Digital Marketing Strategies Conference in Napa features industry leaders and top educators to assist dealers with creating and implementing a strong digital marketing program for this upcoming year.

The event is scheduled just prior to NADA so come out a few days early and participate in the powerful education format.

Speakers and workshop leaders include: Alex Snyder, Matt Murray, Gary May, Sean Wolfington, JD Rucker, Scott Falcone, Glenn Pasch, Christine Rochelle, AJ LeBlanc, Sean Stapleton, Robert Avery, and some surprise guests.

On Friday February 4th the attendees will be driven back to San Francisco to register for NADA. You won’t miss a beat with this powerful combination in 2011.

Signup for the conference at http://www.digitalmarketingstrategies.org/

Conference Details:

• Conference Agenda
• Registration Fees
• Workshop Leaders
• Travel & Accommodations

Contact Automotive SEO company for more details or help on signup. Ananth Godavari of IntelliFusion Technologies will be available during the conference for any custom software programming services and SEO Automated Dealer Websites.

An excellent opportunity for Automotive Dealers to get free training in Automotive SEM and increase sales.

Starting February 15th 2011, Brian Pasch of PCG Digital Marketing will train 100 dealers for 8 weeks on Automotive SEM and how to increase sales. During the course of this free training, dealers will learn how to setup, manage, test and optimize pay-per-click campaigns on Google Adwords and Facebook Ads. The training includes A/B testing processes where dealers can learn how to increase their ROI on paid advertising.

Seats are limited to first 100 dealers, so register now with your dealership email address at http://www.automotivesemstudy.com

Members should be running Google Adwords or should have the authority to setup and spend $1,000 a month for the two month program. If you are already running Adwords, but have a third party running the campaigns, you will still need to setup your own account to get hands on training.

This will be a groundbreaking study of pay-per-click advertising since the A/B testing elements will be very valuable to all members. Too many dealers are spending THOUSANDS of dollars each month on PPC campaigns and are not inspecting or optimizing that spend because they don’t know how to operate these campaigns.

SEM Study members who are interested in improving Organic SEO rankings for their dealership and inventory should contact us for the best strategies in 2011 to increase sales and dominate SERP on major search engines.

The pioneers at Automotive Advertising Network have released a new WordPress Posting tool specifically created for AAN members. This tool will simplify creation of posts based on the AAN Member dealers inventory and creates a full page ad for each individual car that the AAN Member Dealer has in stock. These ads can be posted on any WordPress site in the Network.

Staff at the dealership responsible for content writing need to spend at most than 5 minutes per car to post these ads on high ranking AAN network sites.

To use this tool all the content writer needs to know is the VIN# and Stock# of the vehicle and where to link it to. And that’s it, you have a full Page AD.

If you are a member of AAN you can contact Ananth Godavari to get the tool and for help on how to use it.

A screenshot of the ad is shown here and you can follow the link to see the 2006 Infiniti G37 Santa Ana CA Ad.